Nothings growing on live rock?? PLEASE HELP?!

[laureniron31]

Hi have recently upgraded to a 4ft jewel reef aqaurium, been running for nearly 3 months, we still can't get corals to grow and live rock is bare, water levels are fine and fish are healthy? Anyone got any ideas

 

[ccCapt]

What exactly are your water parameters?
salinity -
temp -
pH -
nitrate -
calcium -
alkalinity -
magnesium -

What kind of lghting do you have?

 

[laureniron31]

Temperatures 26.1, 3 54w marine white t5s and one blue t5
ammonia 0ppm
nitrite 0ppm
nitrate 0ppm
phosphate 0ppm
silicate 0ppm
magnesium 1500ppm
calcium 460 ppm
carbonate hardness 11 dkh
Salinity 1.025
High range ph 8.0

 

[ccCapt]

Your parameters look good, even tho I highly doubt your nitrate is really 0. That is virtually impossible. Same with Phosphate. It's pretty much impossible to have 0 phos.
Besides that, your tank is still very young, maybe too young to even have corals in it yet, alone expect them to grow. There are alot of chemical actions and reactions taking place in a new tank. Give it time.

 

[Reeffanman]

Did you start with dry rock? Or live rock? Do you have algea growing?

 

[laureniron31]

We started with 13-14 kg of our live rock, but we had 35kg of rock second hand when we brought our newest 4ft tank, so we started with live rock, and yes we do algae growing

 

[Reeffanman]

It's possible that your second hand rock has been in contact with copper what happens to corals when you put them in?

 

[laureniron31]

Corals shrivel up and eventually die off, i don't think so as he still had the tank set up when we brought it and he kept corals very successfully

 

[Reeffanman]

It sounds like there is some level in there that's way too high. Do you run carbon

 

[laureniron31]

Yeah we do have a big bag of activated Carbon in sump tank, we also have a phosphate reactor with rowaphose in

 

[mr_X]

Which corals did you try so far?

 

[laureniron31]

We had a established piece of pulsing Xenia that lasted a week, we then had numerouse pieces of candy cane corals that were perfectly fine in other tank but as soon as placed in to new tank have instantly died, we have had Christmas tree frags, mushroom corals and several other pieces, adding up we have probably lost over 100£ worths of coral

 

[mr_X]

What exactly is living in the tank right now? Inverts?

 

[laureniron31]

2 blood red shrimp
2 cleanor shrimp
5-6 blue legged hermit crabs
1 pepper mint shrimp
1 marble snail
1 sand sifting star fish

FISH
2 butterfly gobies
2 common clownfish
2 firefish
2 blue damsels
2 black damsels
1 yellow cowfish

 

[mr_X]

Xenia doesn't seem to do well in some tanks and I don't know why this is. Having inverts in the tank as you do would lead me to believe you don't have anything in the tank like heavy metals or something that you don't have a test kit for, but I wonder about your feeding and nutrient export regimen.
How much are you feeding and how are you exporting nutrients?
High nitrates/phosphates a possibility?

 

[laureniron31]

They get feed 2 times a day with half a marine mix frozen food block, any excess food is fished out but most times it is completely devoured. We have never really had a problem with phosphates ect and all levels have been stable

 

[mr_X]

Just because food is eaten, does not mean it's gone. Everything you put in the tank must be removed, by you, via water changes, skimming, etc. Put a weeks worth of food in your hand and think about how effective your mode(s) of export is.
I'm not saying this is definitely the problem, but I think we can agree that something is definitely wrong. Though I can't see how you could have high nutrient levels without some other symptom, like nuisance algae perhaps.
can I see a pic of the tank?

 

[laureniron31]

the only thing is some red seaweed that grew naturally, as soon as corals go in they die?

 

[laureniron31]

The rock is just bare

 

[mr_X]

That is very strange and I would love to help you, but I'm at a loss at the moment. You have to do a process of elimination- parameters, stray voltage, lighting, heavy metals...etc.
Parameters are good
Stray voltage? How about when you have bare feet and your hand is in the tank? Get a shock?